The present invention relates broadly to paperboard, hand-held containers and, more specifically, to a foldable, hand-held container having a self-supporting frusto-conical, or tapered, body, that is substantially impervious to leaks and can be lined with a superabsorbent material and used as a cuspidor.
Portable, hand-held containers are desirable for a number of reasons. Initially, a portable and collapsible container can provide a receptacle to hold a drink of water for use in administering medication or to quench one's thirst. Essentially, all hand-held containers are portable, however, most drinking containers are not easily stored. Any such container must have a body portion which defines a liquid receiving cavity sufficient in size to hold an acceptable amount of liquid. On the other hand, to be portable in a manner herein described, the container needs to be collapsible in that its liquid receiving cavity may be reduced in volume sufficiently to allow the cup to be stored in a pocket or other confined area that provides a minimum amount of space for a generally flat object.
In response to such a need, several hand-held, collapsible paper containers have been developed. Early attempts fail to provide the advantages of the present invention. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 1,690,586 to Main, a collapsible paper cup is disclosed to be formed from a blank of stock material. The Main '586 cup has a tapered, easily held body that is not self-supporting and is not impervious to fluid leaks, especially at the seams. Another tapered cup, disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,323,287 to Amberg can be prone to leakage due to its seams and single wall construction. Another cup is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,867,374 to Murray et al which does not include a tapered body portion and, while being somewhat self-supporting, is self-supporting in an apparently unstable manner. As seen in FIG. 1, the support walls do not extend substantially around the lower perimeter of the container thereby placing the container in an unstable condition when standing upright and when it is loaded. In addition, the outer walls of Murray et al cup fail to extend fully around the body of the container and the container is not tapered. In combination with the foregoing, its hexagonal shape provides a cup which is dissimilar from conventional, non-collapsible cups.
Additionally, the in the past, disposable containers have been fitted with an absorbent material to absorb any sort of oral discharge deposited therein. This type of container is exemplified in U.S. Pat. No. 869,515 to Potter which discloses a rectangular folding container having cotton or some similar absorbent disposed therein. These types of containers were popular around the turn of the century when tuberculosis was far more active than today and sufferers needed a repository for the coughed-up by-products of their disease. These cups were not intended for use with oral tobacco products.
Modern spittoons, or cuspidors, are exemplified by U.S. Pat. No. 4,858,250 to Lee which is a non-collapsible container having a molded block of hydrophilic polymer disposed therein. The polymer is intended for the absorption of tobacco juice. A more complicated spittoon is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,908,882 to Williams et al, which includes a lidded container of fixed size having an absorbent material disposed in the bottom thereof.